Posts Tagged czech glass

My headpins are the round red base of the earrings, on stainless steel which has a dark patina from the heat. I left them dark rather than polishing them up and put the fritty red and white beads on them before wrapping the rest of the wire into a loop. I made the round earwires in sterling silver with little red Czech glass beads wrapped on. I patinated the silver with liver of sulphur and then tumbled it to give the shiny antique silver finish here.

These are another pair that I’ll be keeping. Picasso-finish Czech glass in a greeny turquoise, wire-wrapped in copper. The bigger beads are from the Curious Bead Shop. These are in my to-be-patinated pile – I want the inner wraps to be quite dark to go with my niobium earwires and then polish back the highlights on the wraps (they’re on copper earwires here). They’re nice and light to be easy to wear.

I have some liver of sulphur gel since my liquid has been unused for years and is likely way past its shelf life, I just need to take the time… I have some other ones that need doing too.

For my earrings this week, I used a pair of beads I made a long time ago.

#21 Thunder Lizard

The lampwork beads are dragonscale ones that I made when I was testing what colours that technique worked with – this pair went much darker because of a reaction with the base glass, but they still have a good organic look.

I also used some Indian agate rondelles in a colour that is really difficult to describe… They’re a slightly translucent mottled brown/lilac that just reads as ‘dark’ most of the time. I added a pair of golden Czech glass pearl nuggets and put them on copper headpins and earwires.

These earrings are to match a necklace I just made. Partly inspired by Elise Matthesen’s necklace-crowns, partly wire-doodling.

#14 Ruby Entwined

Both together – I made the central piece of the necklace first then worked out what to do with it. Brass wire, red and red/yellow Czech glass and a shiny gold mix of seed beads. The wire section was made from one continuous piece. Fun to make, but does get through a lot of wire!

I added brass belcher chain and made a swan neck clasp to finish the necklace.

I used a pair of my older lampwork beads this week: transparent yellow nuggets with small red and orange shards and frit in similar colours. I wanted to use some chain in these, since I never use it. Partly because I find it vary hard to tell what size it is when buying online! I have some miniscule silver chain that I might try and use in another pair… This is a rather nice small 2-in-2 closed link red brass chain. I like the warmth of red brass.

#6 Rainforest Colours

The rest is done in copper. I was wondering what I should dangle off the bottom jumprings and sorted through my bead stash to find these little Czech glass leaves. They have an iridescent green-bronze colour on one side and light brown glass on the other and I think they went really well. This photo shows both sides.

This is an attempt to stop being at least a month behind in my posts! Here’s what I’ve been up to in the last little while – some earrings, some wirewrapping with and without beads, some chain maille, a little seed beading (most recent at top):

I’ve done some more polymer clay beads since then – photos coming soon! I got hold of a second hand pasta machine, which lets you do all kinds of fancy things with polymer clay, so I’ve been making lots of canes to slice up and decorate beads with. (Think of a stick of rock – you assemble everything so the design runs all the way through it, then slice thin pieces off the end to use).